


How far do ripples reach?

by Washedawaycloud



Series: Ripples of Bad Wolf [1]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Accidental Marriage, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Headcanon abounds, Mentioned Bad Wolf (Doctor Who), Rage, Telepathic Bond, Telepathic Sex, Time Lords and Ladies (Doctor Who), Time Lords are Vulcans fight me about it, Time War (Doctor Who), War, canon i don't know her, rage sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-10
Updated: 2020-12-10
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:22:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27992211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Washedawaycloud/pseuds/Washedawaycloud
Summary: In a different universe, the Time War rages and the Doctor is a Warrior. In a different universe, the Corsair was successfully recalled to serve in the War. In a different universe, Bad Wolf touched the Doctor in a far more encompassing way. And it starts, or perhaps ends, here.
Relationships: The Corsair/Eighth Doctor, The Corsair/The Doctor (Doctor Who)
Series: Ripples of Bad Wolf [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2050176
Comments: 3
Kudos: 2





	How far do ripples reach?

**Author's Note:**

> Standard Disclaimers apply: I don't own Doctor Who, work or have an association with the BBC or Neil Gaiman ( creator of my beloved Corsair ). Note I am using HEAVY headcanons in most of al Corsair stories. I haven't listened to the Time War series from Big Finish either yet, so like, buckle up babes we are flying into Canon? Don't Know her- Territory.

When she had left Gallifrey, when her first life was male, and she just needed to _get away_ from the stifled nature of her people, she had never thought to come back. Not seriously, not stepping onto Kasterboros constellation planets with war in her eyes and duty thrumming through her veins. She was an intergalactic thief, an inventor, not a soldier, not even after she’d been dialed back twice into her fifth and sixth lives. She’s been here over a thousand years, fighting for her planet, her people.

She slams a nondescript bit of metal into the dirt, watching with a shred of satisfaction as it flares to life, fusing with other parts she’d placed in the ground, frantic in her need to shield the makeshift hospital. The Child Soldiers that the council had okayed for creation are screaming and dying here. So many had been lost in the dirt of worlds that should have been flourishing with a beautiful life, teeming with stories to be told and waiting to unfold. But no more. This planet would be dead just like so many others that had been Time-Locked with them.

And what were they dying for, the planets, the children? This War, Omega, and Other- it could have gone _so many different ways_. The timelines, there had been a veritable tangle of them, that’s how many choices had been missed and cast aside to get them to this point, where the timelines were straining, time itself, all of time, that in flux and that which all Time Lords run along so carefully avoiding the edge of. Time cried and bled and this war was only ripping deeper into it.

_Time Distortion bombs detected._

The warning makes her shriek in frustration, running as she digs into her bag for time bubble capsules. They could not die here, not today, not any of the poor fuckers under her command in the dirt under her boots. Throwing them, calculating as her arm arcs to make sure they spread properly, the intricate bubbles spring into being. She runs for the TARDIS, pulling on all that she is to slow time so she can get to where she needs to be.

Her communicator crackles to life, but it’s within her mind that she hears words. The subconscious hivemind Gallifreyans were known for had come roaring back to the forefront of their minds. It helped and hurt them in equal measure. 

“Lady General – we don’t have any more capsules! The Battle Fleet is too far away –“

“I’m coming!” Her feet pound on the ground and she _yanks_ until dust particles move like snails and she whips open the doors of her Capsule. Thundering up the ramp, she slams buttons as her connection to Eosphoros explodes to life. She prays, to time itself, that they can make it like this. She is straining for extra seconds but knows it is a slim, slim hope that she will make it before the first of the bomb detonate. Perhaps, if the gods and time are on their side, they’ll make it.

There is no back in the time lock, only forward, forward, always forward, so she must wring and cheat seconds out of Time.

The Capsule spins, no time for stabilizers or any such trivialities this time. She can and does withstand it, hands anchored to the handles of the console as it jolts and slams into the ground. Using the momentum, she flings herself back down the ramp and out of the TARDIS. She has the time to throw two capsules, saving hundreds, before being crippled by the shrieking in her mind. When it’s over, when this attack is done, she rolls on her back in the dirt, surrounded by her wounded follows. They are the only thing standing, the true soldiers, born and bred for this, the rest of them have been conscripted and lay prone on the ground, some eyes open, staring into the world unseeing as the trauma of the dead take them. They cannot keep the screams of death and fear at bay as a soldier can.

Eyes stinging, she rolls, hands pressing into the soft, still living, ground, body shoving itself to stand properly once more “Casualty report,” her voice is hoarse as if it had been her screaming for seconds across a planet, throughout time. Perhaps it had. Her ability to slow time had snapped back into herself as she’d succumbed to their deaths. Around her, some are breaking down, she can’t fault or judge them, nor lay blame at their feet for such a weakness. This is more than enough to crack the steeled façade of even the most devout and logical Time Lord.

“Four hundred survivors, here Lady Corsair. Another five at the camp you left. The Planet is dead, save the bubbles.” The face before her is shrouded, but she can tell it is young. There is a youthful chubbiness to cheeks and jawline that is only ever-present when the face is early in a timeline. Reloomed, she can feel it, thirteen lives gone, thirteen more to give. Poor bastard.

“Get them out of here. Sorenten Seven is lost, we must evacuate before the never-weres and meanwhiles come crawling out of the dirt.”

“Yes, Lady Corsair.”

Turning on her heel, the Corsair is a swirl of a gray trench coat, black leather, and a deeper grey corset that is more in line with body armor. Her hair is covered in dirt, so black it is red, swaying behind her as she makes her way into her TARDIS. Eosphoros, her oldest friend, longest companion, is sad, the song mournful and low. They mourn together as she flips levers and taps buttons, typing in coordinates quietly.

 _Incoming transmission_. The mourning song quiets, and the Corsair hesitates, steeling herself before accepting the call.

“What.”

“You lost the outpost.”

“Your scientists haven't figured out how to block a fucking time distortion bomb, so yes, the outpost is lost. The planet is lost. Seven hundred troops are dead.” Her voice is cold, their mother-language like cloister bells hitting a mountainside. Green eyes stare with icy determination at the monitor, at the Lord General of the Gallifreyan forces. For all she has blinded herself to faces, to her Kithriarch and chains of command, to her friends, her cousins, she knows who this bastard is.

He is an arrogant fucker, she is so close to loathing him for the calls he has made, forced others to make that it tinges every word from her to him, colors her opinion of every order. Death washes over this waste of space and training as if it has no weight. It is enough to drive a person mad.

“You are lauded as the best inventor of your generation, Lady General, or have you forgotten that in your quest to make trinkets and seed unsuitable planets with Coral?” The sneer in his voice makes her bare her teeth in a challenge. Of all her cousins, she is the most feral. Hell, of her friends, she is the most violent outlier.

“I am _one_ Time Lord, Lord General. We do not all have the luxury of the Vortex to hide in and cheat time of precious seconds anymore, as the Laws dictate. Those of us able to twist time efficiently must do so in the dirt to save as much as we have! You want me to fix the distortion bomb problem, give me resources, rather than putting me on the front lines with our ranks full of Children!”

“The Lord President cannot afford to give resources without cause. Our War Looms are effective and far more efficient –“

“You are throwing away the lives of our people!” She screams, voice like chiming lightning, and curses when a hint of smug victory flashes through him. He is heartless, a heartless mathematician of a bastard, like so many others in their stagnated society.

“Lives made for War are not wasted by war.” His calm cracks her own further. “Report to Arcadia, Lady General. Our Lord Commander the Doctor has need of your expertise. Perhaps, between the two of you, you will scrape together something _useful_.”

The transmission cuts out after that and the Corsair screams her fury. A random piece of refuse is snatched from the floor of the console room and whipped across it, smashing into the wall. A waterfall of the charged and clashing shriek of words leave her. War looms, Battle Capsules, Child soldiers. They are becoming as bad as the never-weres, the Daleks. Life devalued at such a rate until it has no meaning in a war is a race to the end of time.

“Contact the Doctor.”

It takes a few minutes, but when the view screen beeps to life, she turns. His face is as haggard as hers likely is, eyes colder, hair shorn short in the view screen, though, her mind does not cotton onto the fact she can see him. Properly see him. Her mind ignores that he is the first face she’s seen in two decades or more. No, her focus is on more important things, needs more important information. He had only recently joined the war, ruthless and efficient in his battle plans. So much so, the Corsair can hardly claim to recognize him. Silence reigns between them for a full breath, for five heartsbeats before she stands tall.

“We are to report to Arcadia, you and I. Or perhaps, just me if you’re already there. What am I stealing this time?” She wants to make a joke like she would have any of the many times they have met for drinks and adventure. However, there isn’t any hope of that this time, there is no joviality left alive in her.

“There will be no theft this time, Lady General.” His voice washes over her, the hum of his timeline, the spark of his mind in the hive of their species becomes brighter in her awareness. They cannot completely communicate in such a manner with her planets away, but their friendship of old strengthened the bond of their people enough, she could glean his coordinates without asking.

“Then what is it I am needed for.”

“We must dismantle the Nightmare Child.”

“I’m not a bloody mechanic, Doctor, the Monk was taken from the Matrix and reloomed, send for him.” She refuses to go near the damned abomination that was that mess of Temporal wrongness.

“I don’t trust the damned Monk, and like hell would I send for the Time Technicians, Mechanic, or any of the other Chapter Houses’ cousins to do this.” His voice is steel, and she _hates_ this war. Hates what it is turning them into, has turned the Doctor into. He won’t trust his own damned people. Will only call for another Prydonian to possibly die alongside him? This is the blindness of war that terrifies her.

Scrapped palms press into her closed eyes, and the Corsair groans loudly. At the heart of it, he is a warrior now. No longer the idealistic healer. It doesn’t make any sense. Who had burned the compassionate poet out of him? No one knew what had happened to him with the TARDIS’ signal crashed onto Karn, when his mind had gone silent for long enough the former Lady President could be felt to worry. No one knew how he had come back like this.

“You’re going to get us both fucking killed. No one, _no one_ , has approached that abomination and survived it. How do you propose we dismantle a corrupted Time Worm exactly?!”

“Get to Arcadia, you know where I am, I’ll tell you when we’re face to face.”

“I’d rather run to the end of fucking time,” she spits, hands slamming onto the console.

“And you think I don’t?” The growl that leaves him has her baring her teeth again, feeling threatened. They are the most dangerous people in any room, they are the ones who play nice while rage bubbles under their skin. And the Lord General wants them on a mission together?

“You think I want to be making battle plans, watching _children_ die?! You think I rejoice at sending Ships full of our people – _our families_ \- into the voice, at a pace that is sickening, at the risk we may never be able to pull those ships back?”

“ **Then we should run!** ” She shrieks, hands slapping the console again. “All of us. Every last Gallifreyan should run. Abandon the planet – destroy it, assimilate into other Gallifreyanoid species, _live another day_. This war is madness, it is killing us, and not just our physical bodies!”

“Get to Arcadia, Corsair. And yes, it’s a Rassilon damned _order_.” He cuts the feed on her and she howls her rage into the empty TARDIS once again. Eosphoros doesn’t make a move to comfort her, knowing these moments must be felt, that they will only come more frequently. He knows his Captain and the Doctor must feel these emotions.

“Set Coordinates.” The croaked words are obeyed without sound, flight sequence automated, initiated by the Time Capsule before a soft song of soothing slips through their bond. The ship needs her as much as she needs him, has always needed him. It was why he chose her all those millennia ago.

“I wish I knew if we will see the stars again after this, old boy.”

When she walks down the gangplank of her Time Capsule a full five minutes later, she is still covered in dirt and blood, with the Doctor waiting for her. He is clean, brown leather on his shoulders. It is the only thing showing any wounds from this damned war. Her teeth grind together as she descends, pausing only when they are shoulder to shoulder, a hand span between them.

“I’m here. Let’s get on with this damned suicide mission, shall we?”

He huffs a laugh, a mirthless, cold sound full of anger that she feels radiating from him, the _only_ thing she feels off of him even being this close. That’s never been the case in the past, and she absolutely loathes it.

“Get food, Corsair, sleep, a shower. Reports state you set up six embankments in the last hour alone, saved an equal number to those lost. You have run through this system on the heels of the Daleks as ordered and fought with ferocity. The Lord General is… pleased.”

“Oh, _fuck_ the Lord General.” She snaps, twisting only her head to look at him for a moment before stalking toward the hall that will house the barracks. Sleep, that is a laugh and a half. How could any of them sleep? Such a thing was well beyond her, horror and pain keeping it from her grasp on even her worst days. She hasn’t slept in months.

“I doubt he would be amenable to such a spitfire in his chambers, let alone his mind.” The humor laced into that statement snaps something in her. She whirls, and he is there, hand catching her wrist, one poised to slap him for daring. That contact, and her lack of sleep, let his mind shatter her barriers in a moment. It’s embarrassing how flimsy they’ve become. Arctic blue swarms her raging gold and she fights, shoving it away.

“Get. Out.” Her teeth bite into each word, jaw jumping, green eyes boring into the blue.

“No.” He states it so simply that it almost shocks her. “You are a hazard that no one has addressed. I am going to address it.” His mind presses in against hers and all she can feel is his frigid chill, attempting to drown the heat of her rage. A rage she didn’t realize was burning her half alive.

“It’s not your bloody fucking place,”

“I am one of your oldest friends, your commander, _you_ are my business, this is my place.” Her back hits the wall, and it jars her from mentally fighting him. She hadn’t registered that they’d been moving. But the moment of shock is fleeting, and her mind surges against his as her free hand lifts, shoving hard against his chest. She may be a touch weaker in this smaller, more compact frame, but she’s still stronger than your average Time Lord.

“Fuck you.”

Blue eyes pinned her in place for a heartbeat. “Is that what you need?” He watches her like someone would a feral horse-cat and it makes her smirk. He should be wary; they all fucking should be. They push, and push, and push for the so called Greater Good of the universe, yet the Universe is burning around them.

“A tumble from a virgin isn’t going to fix me.” His eyes go dark, a storm brewing in them. Something in her preens, sitting up and taking notice, pleasure in his ire.

“Not a virgin.” The words aren’t said, not those at least. “A fight then.” His head tilts, eyes boring into her still. “Or perhaps, a fight and a thorough fucking.” His mind _slides_ chilly still, against hers, seeking out a place that makes her sigh and go slack in his hold.

The moment she comes back to reality – because she has never had anyone touch her mind with that sort of intent – she attacks him. She reaches for the soft underbelly of his consciousness and jabs while her fist swings. She’s so _angry_. She hurts so much that her hearts ache worse after every battle.

Her friend should not have been able to parry her so well. The Doctor had never been as much a fighter as her, with her being a brawler through and through. Yet he parries her with ease. His mind has armor where he should be soft, it makes her snap and snarl at him.

They hit the floor, a yelp and groan leaving them, respectively. She has the upper hand, and she takes it, only for her to be flipped. They roll, they crash into each other, and then she is pinned beneath him, prone. His mind slides from chilly to molten heat as he caresses her. The mental touch makes her molten metal-colored mind sing solid for a moment, her back arching up off the floor. Her wrists twist uselessly in his hold as his mouth finds her neck. Dual pulse points, so much blood so close to the surface makes necks a tender spot for most and she is not immune.

Her name slides from his mind into hers, he strokes along the cooling gilt of her mind to make her writhe under him. Her respiratory bypass fails her, and she pants underneath him. His teeth dig into the spot where her neck meets her jaw, mental fingers slide over the foundations of her mind and she keens for him. It’s involuntary. She could stop him, but she needs something other than rage right now. She needs this touch, him.

“You need more than just touches,” he intones against her neck, where she knows a bruise will be forming soon. It is a statement, not a question. He knows her far too well after so many years of sporadic meetings. That or the gossiping biddies of the Council were once again annoyed with her ‘undignified base drives’.

“Shut up. Get your fucking pants off, Doctor.” Her cheeks are coral red as she makes her demand. All she gets for it is a kiss that bruises, bouncing her head off the floor. They bite at once another, soft kisses are for lovers in the quiet of the night, not friends in the middle of a mad war that will eventually see them dead, in full view of anyone who may land on this pad.

The push of his mind on hers makes her keen, a sound he readily swallows as he establishes a rhythm of teasing presses and caresses in their now shared mental landscape. They are blue and gold and green. His hands release her wrists, pulling at her battle-worn clothing. The corset gives him an issue, a big enough block that his sonic is produced, her laces unraveled at an atomic level so he can pull it from her. Their boots clatter in the silence of the room, his hands and mind burning a path from her hips to breasts. Her arms pull him tight against her, her mind no longer raging, eager and desperate in the grasp of his. She hasn’t been this wet in years, hasn’t needed a fuck this badly in all her lives.

Though he is undressing her, it is shocking when the Doctor ruts against the junction of her thighs, harder than any metal she knows. He is hard and she had never thought him capable. Oh, he was just as ‘other’ as her, but this? 

“Bless your time spent on Earth,” the words are breathy, grunted as she bucks up against him.

“No.” He growls it against her collarbone, the one emblazoned with her tattoo. “It’s you, your hormones, your pheromones.” He groans when her hands meet his skin, his jacket gone, shirt pulled from him in jerky movements.

“I can’t not react to you,” he groans, a hand shoving between them, clever fingers finding her center in record time. “You’re screaming for it in all the ways they say we can’t.” His heated chill suffuses her mind as his fingers shove into her without ceremony or warning. Her body – this body – is untried, but for all it doesn’t know this kind of touch, she still shrieks in pleasure.

His chiming laughter fills her mind, a sense of satisfaction leaks into their mindscape, and has her raking her nails down his back, pressing gently into a nerve cluster that makes him shout. “Fucker, don’t be so smug.”

“Don’t scream my name, then.”

Her response is to bite at his pulse point, grinning when he thrusts against her cunt and his hand with a yell. The shock of it allows her to press her desire and pleasure into his mind. Let’s him feel how divine his fingers are inside of her, even as she cries out when he thrusts them. She allows him the pleasure of knowing how stretched just that feels to her before she finds the live wire of his desire and strums it just once before enveloping him as he had her.

Their hands are scrabbling at each other, trousers shoved so the important bits are available, her legs pulled up, up, up until she is bent in half. He is hot and hard, a sudden intrusion that has her losing her breath. He’s tall enough that he can still press so her temple touches her, just long enough a feedback link is properly established. She is breathless and they have barely started.

Her legs are trapped, she is bent so she can only take what he gives her – in a physical manner. In their mindscape it is different, she winds around his lust with hers, delicate touches making him swear, the crashing of cloisters and grinding of clock gears filling the silence between her cries. His fingers dig into her hips so hard she knows she will need a session with a dermal regenerator after this.

His mind slides against hers expertly, finding little places to touch and tickle that make her squirm and clench around him. They are breathless, entranced by one another, by the hot drag of his cock inside her, the way her body pulls at him, welcomes him, slick and warm and _his_.

He pushes, she pulls, the thread of _mine_ echoes but neither pay attention. They should. But they are so wrapped up in one another, in a release so needed they are starving for it, they cannot tell where one of them begins and ends. It’s part of why touching minds in a sensual manner is dangerous – according to Time Lord custom. During the physical act of copulation, it is taboo – again according to the Time Lords. They are above such base needs and desires after all. It’s why they have looms. It’s why they bred out pesky raging libidos in favor of low functioning ones. It's why exploration is discouraged, especially between compatible minds, between friends. It is far too easy to tie themselves to one another when biology and instinct finally comes to bear.

Her orgasm hits her like a freight train, mind bursting into supernovas and stardust as her body snaps under his. She’s sure she must be screaming, and the Doctor is still fucking into her, still pressing heat, blue, want, need and himself, all of himself into her. Her nails score his back as she starts to slip, remaining walls starting to fall, falling rapidly.

It’s one thing to let him into her mind for this, for the release, the catharsis, the reminder they are alive. But now there are doors opening that have been locked for years, centuries, lifetimes on top of lifetimes. He is seeing all of her, and to her shock, he is allowing her to see all of him. His mind is a Storm, of thoughts emotions, prescient moments of time that weigh heavy on his soul.

It’s more intimate than she wants, but it is what she needs. She needs this, to be this buried in something other than pain, regret, and rage. So, she lets it happen, lets him barrel into her, wash over her, seek her out. She strokes at his affection, nuzzles into his idea of comfort.

She doesn’t know when he flips her onto her knees, doesn’t quite register when he grips her tighter than before, a new set of his fingerprints on her to wear. There’s no indication the first round has merged into a second, but when she has a moment of clarity when his teeth sink into her shoulder, she feels how slick she is, knows it is the both of them and not just her. Her cheek pressed to the floor, his chest is plastered against his back, their pants at their knees. He ruts into her, she rocks back. He shifts, a hand pressed into the small of her back and his cock pummels at her cervix, sending her flying faster than the first time.

Their clothes are found by a bewildered docking technician, just minutes after the Doctor hauls the Corsair into his arms, disappearing into his TARDIS. When they collapse into his bed, he is thrusting up into her, making her gasp and cry out. There is the passing thought he may have needed this more than she did. He rides her like they might die tomorrow - until she can get on top of him and makes him slow down.

It’s not so much that he is conquered by her as he allows her to drive. His hands are finally not holding so hard to leave marks, but they trail over her skin like he is branding her. Maybe he is. Her hands are doing the same, seeking out as much contact as she can without leaning down and letting him take over. She is steady on top of him, rising and falling like the ebb of time.

His hand slides up her body, brushes her throat, cups her cheek, draws her down. The one last line they have not crossed, and he aims to obliterate it. He kisses like sin when it isn’t about conquering, she decides, tasting of everything she knows so well and has avoided for so long. He catalogs her, seduces her with careful motion, and coy inviting slides of his tongue against hers. It’s the last thing she should do with him, kissing like this is for lovers, kissing like **this** anyway.

Especially when he shows her how to kiss _properly_. The gentle press of affection, sweet pinks, and yellows swirling around her before blue ever so gently entwines with gold. It leaves her sighing, melting into his hold. Even when he turns them, takes his place over her again, there is no rush. He drives them higher at an almost sedate pace, and when they crash it is together.

They collapse, properly collapse, and her internal clock tells her it’s been two hours since she landed. Her breaths are hard, entire being tired, exhausted really. The rage that plagued her is simmering still but has been soothed by the Doctor. She is pulled close by war worn hands, the gentle call of her name, calling her to sleep, pulls her deep into an abyss of nothingness.

Twelve hours, seven minutes, and thirty seconds later, the Corsair swims into consciousness. The room isn’t hers, the sheets smell of leathers, sex, the Doctor and her, making her sigh. That hadn’t been even remotely close to the best idea she’s had in this life, or really any life. Moving to sit up, a hand on her clavicle presses her back against a body she knows just a touch too well now.

 _Sleep_. A single rumbled word in her mind makes her eyes pop open in horror.

 _Sleep_.

His mind slides against hers, soothing, seducing her into shared dreams. She doesn’t acknowledge her hand threading her fingers through his, resolutely doesn’t acknowledge his leg between hers, focusing instead on the slow thump of his hearts against her back, in time with her own. Sleep once more claims her, ice blue surrounding her, and the war rages outside, forgotten for a few more precious moments of peace.

When the Time Lady finally wakes again, twenty hours have passed, and her wake up is the slow shove of his cock into her again. His mind is already there, a pleased hum sounding across her mental landscape. She huffs at him in return, rocking back. He laughs aloud, teeth at her neck before his temple touches hers again. It’s not even needed, his mind already there, already flooded together with hers.

 _This isn’t good_ , she whines as he fucks into her, slow and steady, a metronome of sliding out of her, filling her again.

 _Can’t fix it now_. His retort is utterly shameless, tinged with a hint of pleasure. _Just, accept it, enjoy it, help me stay sane, and I’ll help you to._

Her laugh trails into a moan, and they don’t speak again until he’s spilled into her with her screaming for him again. It’s not until she is in the shower with him that she _looks_ at him, finding some of the rage that she’d seen yesterday has been tempered. His shoulders are not set so rigidly, his eyes are softer.

“We could be regenerated for this.” She can’t _not_ say it. They are tied, she can feel their timelines twining tightly together. Mating like this, it’s not done, not allowed, in the Caste they’ve attained.

“They’d need to find out first, and then they risk two of their most effective assets.” His shrug is lackadaisical, but she can feel the rise of protectiveness told in the whispers of low-town rising in him as he pulls her into the spray, hands moving into her hair to work the dirt from it.

“We shouldn’t have.” Her voice is low, tired, fearful.

He steals a kiss from her to chase away her fear. He has always enjoyed kissing in this life, perhaps even craved it. “Since when, Wife, were you a voice of reason.” He thinks of the Bank of England, of the way they’d laughed when he was eleven and told him when he was older they would steal him away.

“You know when,” she replies morosely, projecting the day she had shown up, peaches and cream complexion with brown hair thinking she was up for another job and had been turned into a soldier instead. The day she was appointed to General status. Trying to save as many as she could in this pointless, terrifying war. All of it is slid across their link, into his mind.

The Doctor sobers, nodding, curling himself around her while the water washes away the soap in her hair. He wasn’t usually the type to admit this sort of thing, but he had a reason to go on now. There was a single bright spot in the war now – her, them.

Her mind flashes pink, making him laugh. He’d wanted a closeness to them from the first. He’d idolized their first regeneration, the most daring – fascinating- renegade he’d heard of in the academy chapter house rooms. Piloting the stars, blessedly free, alone, not bending to whim to the Council and society’s demands. The perfect life.

That pink – no it’s coral, like her blushes – color pervades her mind and bond once more but he shrugs, buffeting her with affection. Emotions are something he has in spades, excels at, and always has. Empathy, compassion, understanding in his earlier lives had given way to affection and love somewhere in his third life, courtesy of Sarah Jane. Not fiery romance, but deep unconditional friendship. Rage, real bubbling roiling rage, had come with Six and Seven if he isn’t mistaken, and lust followed into his current life.

That it won’t be crushed out of him is a bit of a balm.

The Corsair sighs allowing herself to wrap around the Doctor. Her bonded mate. She’s honestly reluctant to even allow this much affection – keener to run from it than he could ever fathom. However, the image of a man, slender, three-fingered, hair, and eyes like starlight set against silver skin filters into his awareness, he understands. He understands wholly. His hearts crack for the pain that hasn’t quite healed over in those of his wife.

It’s later, after a good scrub for the both of them, and a good cuddle under the heated water, when she’s inspecting herself in the mirror for new scars, that she catches sight of him and stops dead. Her eyes are blown wide pupils pinpricks, all gloriously green but terrified because his face is in her field of vision. His beautiful, scruffy rectangular face with heavy-lidded blue eyes. He is beautiful, even with his hair cropped short. Beautiful and _she sees him_.

Her breath comes in little sips, too fast and it catches his attention. Blue eyes find green in the mirror and the ice of him has melted away, only concern shows on his face. “Corsair?”

“I see you.” The words are out as if she’d been struck. Before she can tell her mind _no,_ before she even really absorbs that she is seeing him in great detail, the words are out between them. In a heartsbeat her mind is encompassed by shock, the white of it leaching into the bond that shines in red-toned gold between them.

“What?” He hadn’t realized, but now, as his mind casts back, he remembers how bitterly the High General had complained. How the Council had worried if it got out, they would have far fewer loyal soldiers for the cause.

“I – my sixth self, when my timeline was dialed back, when it changed with my death, in accordance with this fucking war. I made myself face blind, I’ve always been good at regeneration.” She breathes shallowly, and he worries she might make herself hyperventilate. “I wanted to honor my mother, guardian, whatever. She’s dead, I wanted to honor her, wanted them to all fucking _kick rocks_ , and made myself face blind.”

She laughs a little hysterically, and the doctor moves toward her. “My commander was furious, Rhysia’s Kithriarch almost disowned me. No ingrained loyalty, no first face to hold me all my life. I can still run.” Eyes as green as the grass of Earth pin him in place and she turns an ashen gray. “Could. Could still run. Fuck. **_FUCK_**.”

Calloused hands cup her shoulders, and he shifts so he can see her eye to eye. “Calm yourself, love. You can see me, that doesn’t mean –“

“Come off it,” she grinds out, shaking him off. “You know what it means. You’re the first face _this face_ has seen. You’re my touchstone now, my homing beacon, the one I’ll run for no matter bloody what.” It’s not a love thing, never has been, though it _can_ be if the feelings are already there. And doesn’t that just really turn this all upside down. The Doctor is her friend, one of the oldest she’s kept, and now there is _this_ between them, now – now there is a golden-red passion bond that makes them married.

She’s so terribly bitter, confused, and more than a little scared. Because this Doctor doesn’t run, not anymore. He’d _been_ running, but Karn happened, now he’s in the thick of it, and she would have to stay. He is important to her, it’s stamped across her psyche, her hearts and it is devastatingly terrifying. Add to that, she can feel the bond settle between them. It is bloodied gold and pleasantly hums over the bonds of her family that had been paramount, if strained, over the bonds of their species, he is _the most important_. The Doctor’s bloody _Wife_. Time and Stars above how _the fuck_ did she allow this to happen.

“Corsair,” His hands take hold of her face, kind in the pressure used to hold her still, tilting her head so she looks at him. “Take a breath, Corsair, come on.”

She tries, really, she tries, but not even her damn bypass is kicking in and _Rassilon_ , how do other species _do this_. “Come here, easy now.” He turns her carefully, effortlessly moving her around with gentle touches and when did his hands move from her face? His chest presses to her chest, a hand presses against her sternum and he breathes for her. The panic that clouds her mind, the grey static lightning that shocks the bond doesn’t throw him off course.

Time shifts around them, as he steadies her breathing with his, as he coaxes her back down to the solid ground beneath their feet. She feels as if something sharp has taken all her tethers, _snicker-snack goes the vorpal blade_. There is a whisper of calm, tinged the prettiest rose, the scent of pure time invading her senses.

 _I want you safe, my Doctor_.

The words swirl in her mind brilliant rose gold before it’s gone before the words are hidden away deep within her mind again.

“This isn’t ideal by modern standards,” the rumble of his voice cuts into her mind, arctic silver washing over her to soothe her. “But, we’ve been friends for centuries. A bond, well, at least you care for me and I for you. I’ve had marriages built on less.”

She snorts, huffing a shattered laugh. “Could have been tied to the Rani, I suppose.” When did they sit on the ground? She only now notices that they are seated on the warm tiles of the bathroom. “I’m not built for this anymore, we’re in the middle of this Omega be damned war –“

“Stop. One, the Rani would have vivisected me the moment a bonding was even suggested. Two, None of us are built for this, haven’t been for millennia, Rassilon made sure of it, the controlling codger and B –“

“Three – stop interrupting.”

“You first.”

Her laugh is less shattered, and just watery this time as she sags against him. She was knackered, and her eyes aren’t obeying her command to dry up the tears. How can species built to wear their emotions on their sleeves deal with this? Her head leans back against his shoulder, and she takes a breath.

“I suppose, you need to hear it then,” in the safety of his TARDIS, who would never betray her pilot, the Corsair whispers the chiming sound of her name. There is a wellspring of meaning in each name on Gallifrey, and hers is not left out. She has always had an odd fondness for the warmth of it, like the breeze that made the Cadonwood trees sing just before night fell. It’s her name and her choice to seal the mistake they’ve made for better or worse. She does not, under any circumstances, expect to hear chimes of baritone in return. His name makes her shiver as it wraps itself around the entirety of her being. It sinks into the marrow of her bones, she will never forget, and never betray this secret, never wield the power of it without absolute need. It’s no surprise now, why Lungbarrow and Prydon kept the Doctor so carefully guarded. It’s no surprise they were so cruel to him, why he was called on and shunned in equal measure. It isn’t a surprise, but she would see them pay for the way they’ve treated him.

His name is fear, but he is hope, that last syllable reminding her, giving her a bit of comfort as they sit together.

“Well,” his arms curl tighter around her middle. “I suppose you are of Lungbarrow now.”

“Please, you’re obviously of House Rhysia, I wouldn’t claim Lungbarrow even if you were their most treasured son.” She pulls from him, just a touch, and resigns herself to what they must do now. “Clothes, then food, then, the Nightmare Child. Let’s try to save some ungrateful Time Lord hide.”

**Author's Note:**

> So to save my, and your sanity, I'm going to try doing this in a series of one-shots. If I can't this will end up a chapter story in a series. I have a pretty clear mental plan for it already. I will be posting for this and my other Corsair/Doctor story alternately.


End file.
